If you are a frequent traveler, you’re certainly familiar with the call for passengers to put their cell phones into “airplane mode” during takeoff and landing of a flight.
You Don’t Need to Use Airplane Mode on Airplanes
I read a recent article on Gizmodo titled “You Don’t Need to Use Airplane Mode on Airplanes“. They quote the fact that Europe is doing away with requiring airplane mode on planes, though Europe’s 5G frequencies are different than the ones used in the United States. Banning cell phone use on airplanes has been a thing in the U.S. since 1991, though in 2005, an FCC member testified before Congress that it was no longer an issue because of pico-cells.
“With advances in cell phone technology since 1991, [the FCC’s] rule banning 800 MHz cell phone use in flight, may not be needed in order to protect the terrestrial or ground-based cellular networks,” said FAA administrator Nicholas Sabatini in his testimony.
What Airplane Mode Does
Gizmodo continues with what they claim is the “real” reason that airplane mode is required
The real reason is this: Airlines think people won’t stop yapping on their cell phones during flights, leading to more instances of “air rage.” That’s why regulators continue to ban phone calls and data usage on planes: it’s just plain annoying.
Air rage—the violent anger directed at flight attendants and passengers caused by the stressors of air travel—is a huge problem in the United States, and it’s getting worse. The FAA reported more than 10,000 unruly passengers between 2021 and 2023, a roughly 300% increase from 2018-2020. However, it’s also the reason myths about airplane mode have persisted.
The Bottom Line
Perhaps this is a situation where I am just confirming my own biases, but I have not put my cell phone into airplane mode in several years. I do not actively text or make phone calls while on a plane, but I also don’t actually turn the phone onto airplane mode. I have to imagine that I am not the only one.
What do you think? Does putting your phone in airplane mode actually do anything? Should the US follow Europe’s lead?
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
I do it just to save batteries, as the phone keeps trying to connect with a non-existent network at 35000 feet in the air.
This is my answer also.
Who is scamming who out of what?
I just turn it off after takeoff and turn it on shortly before landing. (About 10,000 ft for both) It is always in silent mode on a plane)
This is why I am glad that my phone will just kaput at about 1000 feet
I just put on vibrate. May use phone to follow airplane progress or recorded shows. No texts or calls come in until near landing.
That seems like a sensible way to do it
There is also a risk of connecting to the airplanes cellular data plan network on some flights if you have roaming on – which can be an expensive surprise.
As a recent retired airline pilot, I can assure this is not true. Roaming is an out dated service since the introduction of 5th generation cellular networks. Also, above 3000 feet you loose all connectivity with cellar networks. And one last thing, the radio technology is far greater than cellular network technology including 5G networks. One would have to try very hard to defeat the comm frequencies used in the aviation industry.
I actually made a call from 35,000ft somewhere over Utah back in the early 90’s. The call dropped when it couldn’t hand off to the next tower. Of course the call was never billed and the reason cellular has been prohibited from the beginning. Not interference with airline communications but the inability to bill.
PS – I worked in telecom for 20 years – the last 7 building cellular networks.
I shut my phone off and use my iPad to watch shows, and movies or just listen to music
Although there are as many reasons to put cell phones in airplane mode when on airplane as there is to not put your cell phone in airplane mode, I hope the practice continues to ask people to put cell phones in airplane mode when on an airplane mainly for health and safety reasons.
I am electronic engineer who specializes in radio frequency (RF) technology and I prefer to ride in airplane with all cell phones placed in airplane mode because it disables the cell phone from radiating 2.4 GHz and 5 GHZ microwave energy. Cell phones in normal mode radiate RF energy that increases and decreases from a few milliwatts up to 1 watt when searching for a cell tower in order to make a good connection. The metal skin of an airplane is a good RF reflector that would contain most of that cell phone radiated energy (windows help but do not mitigate the energy) …… so you can imagine that it would not be good for a person to sit in an environment for a couple hours while being radiated by 200-300 microwave radiating devices.
My opinion and 2 cents worth …… thank you for time reading this and your future consideration when riding on an airplane.
There is a setting on your phone where you could make Wi-Fi calls if no cell your service is available. I can assure you this happened to me one time when I was in the air above 30,000 feet and received a phone call. Apparently I had not shut this off, the flight attendant sitting next to me was shocked as I was.